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Britishperceptions of Buddhism tended to be surprisingly vague during the early part of the nineteenth century. Even so reputed an "authority" on India at the time as James Mill, for example, does not appear to have known anything definite on the subject; his famous The History of British India (1818) incorporates some lengthy commentaries on India'scultural and intellectual achievements, but save for a bare reference, Buddhism, significantly, escaped his consideration. Evidently, James Mill, to all intents and purposes, viewed India as home to a single indigenous religion, Hinduism.(1) These perceptions, however, changed in due course, thanks to the advance of Orientalscholarship, especially Western research on Buddhist textual sources. It is perhaps worth noting in this connection that in an essay written in the 1850s, James Mill's son and disciple John Stuart Mill actually alluded to Buddhism'snirvanicideal while trying to make a case for the this-worldly, antisupernaturalistic "Religion of Humanity" whcich both he and Auguste Comte (among others) regarded as a possible substitute for the West's old established creeds.(2) John Stuart Mill's grasp of Buddhism was no doubt rudimentary, but this allusion at least indicates that he had come to see it not only as a distinctreligion but also as one which upheld some strikingly untypical standpoints. As these standpoints subsequently became better known, Buddhism won for itself more forthright admirers, both in Britain and also elsewhere in Europe. In a recent paper Christopher Clausen has indeed gone so far as to identify Buddhism "as the most appealing of non-Christian religions to the nineteenth century mind" and, in commenting on its overall impact, has observed that "as time went on, Buddhist terms and concepts became available for general use in moral, philosophical and religiousdiscussion even by people who were not particularly attracted by the system as a whole."(3)

Evidently, this phenomenon exemplifies a particular kind of East-West contact in the sphere of ideas and values which took place in the last century. And there is, I think, a notable late Victorian context where its character and scope are interestingly epitomized. The context in question, to be sure, is T. H. Huxley's Evolution and Ethics, a work which originated in this highly versatile British scientist-thinker's Romanes Lecture, delivered at Oxford University in 1893.(4) Darwinian approaches--a profound and pervasive influence in the Victorian milieu--are very noticeable in the complex moral and philosophicaldiscussion that is set forth here. And this work has, as a result, attracted a good deal of attention from those interested in contemporary intellectual history in particular.(5) But I do not think the excursus into Buddhistthought that it contains has

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been closely scrutinized by anyone, especially with a view to bring into focus the innovative "comparativist dimension" it projects, for Huxley indeed sought on occasion to juxtapose Buddhist and Westernphilosophicalideas. I propose in what follows to remedy this neglect.

Of course, Buddhism was not a field in which Huxley could claim expert, firsthand knowledge; still, it would be well to bear in mind that his brief evaluation of this religion cannot be dismissed as a purely amateurish effort. In a passing yet noteworthy remark, Mrs. Rhys Davids has called it the "most remarkable contribution of any lay student to the philosophy of Buddhism,"(6) This tribute is not undeserved, considering Huxley's time and background. I think one may fairly say that Huxley's evaluation of Buddhism has first of all a historical significance; but what it highlights to the modern reader is, more than anything else, an East-West philosophicalcontact of a striking nature. Its importance from this angle is perhaps enhanced by the comparative intent that enlivens his clarification of certain basic Buddhist notions. The parallelisms that Huxley draws between Buddhist and Westernphilosophical approaches are not, as will be seen later, beyond criticism; yet this procedure--the use of analogies and parallels drawn from Westernthought as aids in the exegetical process--has a considerable significance of its own. For Huxley might be said to bear witness here to an early inchoate attempt to engage in the kind of investigation that nowadays goes under the name of comparative philosophy. Victorian Buddhism, it would thus appear, could be associated not only with the origins of comparative religion, as Clausen(7) has indeed shown, but also with the origins of compara-philosophy. However, it would be appropriate now to leave these preliminaries aside and turn to our subject itself.

II

T. H. Huxley was a paleontologist with a medical background who gained great prominence in the nineteenth century as one of the foremost defenders of Darwin's evolutionary theory. Victorians were often inclined to see him as "the living embodiment of science militant,"(8) for Huxley actually clashed with contemporary defenders of Biblical supernaturalism in the name of science.(9) A very late product of his intellectual career, Evolution and Ethics (1893) shows him in a mellowed, reflective mood. The radical disjunction between the ethical and the cosmicprocesses such as is frequently highlighted here hardly squares with "orthodox" Darwinism; in fact Irvine has called Huxley's effort in this context a "somewhat puzzling manoeuvre" that is "full of talk about Indianmysticism and of protest about the cruelties of evolution."(10) Yet his overall treatment of his theme is not a matter that need concern us now.(11) What must be noted, on the other hand, is that in the course of his professed endeavor to inquire into the origin and the basis of ethical values from an evolutionary standpoint, Huxley indeed undertook a brief survey of the leading philosophies that had helped to form mankind's conceptions of such values. He emphasized in this connection

How did Huxley regard Buddhism? His overview of this religion's standpoints and the estimate of its impact on civilization came towards the close of his evaluative remarks set forth in the Evolution and Ethics. But for purposes of our present inquiry it is perhaps best to note them at the outset, for the undertone of admiration one recognizes here indeed reflects the positive reception accorded to Buddhism in certain Victorian circles. Buddhism was, Huxley said:

He paused to consider some of the details relating to this religion in a more measured manner. Huxley quite rightly looked upon Buddhism as a system which had developed against the background of the "prevalent Brahmanical doctrine."(13) Moreover, he was mindful of the fact that there was much common ground between these two historic religions of India. He nevertheless pointed out that the Buddha had stepped out of the bounds of Brahmanicalorthodoxy and infused new ideas into Indianreligiousthinking. And he not only went to some lengths in emphasizing these new ideas but also sought to make them more "intelligible" by drawing attention to similar ideas and approaches that are found in Western thought.(14) The parallelisms identified in this connection are not without significance. But what is most noteworthy, it would be well to reiterate, is the underlying procedure, namely, the innovative tendency to link Eastern and Westernideas. For this, I believe, marks one of the less remembered yet interesting beginnings of comparative philosophy.

This remark highlights Huxley's evident desire to link a distinctive feature in Buddhistphilosophical attitudes with a particular phase in the development of Britishempiricism. Though only Berkeley is actually mentioned, what he no doubt wanted to emphasize was that the Buddhist critique of substance was wider, more penetrating and consistent than Berkeley's famous attack on the Lockean concept of substance.(17) For a characteristic feature of Buddhistthinking is indeed the rejection of substantiality in a total sense--including very strikingly any hint of it in the psychical realm. Accordingly, the Buddha emerged in Huxley's evaluation as a philosophical analyst of greater subtlety than Berkeley. While he argued against the "substance of matter," Berkeley, Huxley pointed out, failed to realize that "the non-existence of a substance of mind is equally arguable" and, furthermore, that the consistent application of empiricistprinciples finally led to the reduction of everything to "co-existences and sequences of phenomena, beneath and beyond which there is nothing cognoscible."(18) Now this was very much the Buddhist position, and it was also the position towards which Hume subsequently developed British empiricism.(19) Interestingly enough, the parallelisms that exist between Buddhist and Humean standpoints on the question of a substantial soul were duly noted by certain early commentators on Buddhism. Mrs. Rhys Davids, for example, remarked that "with regard to the belief in an indwelling spirit or ego, permanent, unchanging, unsuffering, Buddhism took the standpoint two thousand four hundred years ago of our own Hume of two centuries ago".(20) And recently, comparativists have of course sought to delve thoroughly into these parallelisms.(21) Thus a point Huxley may well have emphasized is that the Humean position was to all intents and purposes foreshadowed in Buddhism. Yet he did not do so. What struck him instead was the Buddha's analytical acumen vis a vis Berkeley. "It is," Huxley affirmed, "a remarkable indication of the subtlety of Indian speculation that Gautama should have seen deeper than the greatest of modernidealists." But he added at the same time: "though it must be admitted that, if some of Berkeley's reasonings respecting the nature of the spirit are pushed home, they reach pretty much the same conclusion."(22)

Most students of Buddhist philosophy, I am sure, might not concede that a virtual metaphysicalreductio ad absurdum of this kind is really entailed by the anattan doctrine even at the purely intellectual level. But given Huxley's linkage of Buddhism with Berkeley (the proponent, in his view, of an idealistic system who showed a penchant for phenomenalistic analysis) , and again given his readiness to credit the Buddha with having "seen deeper than the greatest of modern idealists,"(24) this particular assessment, though perhaps mistaken in its final details, is I think nevertheless not surprising.

In any event, Huxley, it must be observed, did not consider Buddhistthinking to be unique solely because of the new interpretation it gave to the idea of substance. The pre-Buddhist approaches to salvation that held sway in India, he noted, were commonly predicated on a strong reliance on the need to mortify the flesh.(25) "With just insight into human nature," the Buddha, Huxley remarked, never prescribed extreme ascetic practices. Buddha's followers, he found. overcame passions and appetites through the steady cultivation of moral virtues--"by universalbenevolence; by return of good for evil; by humility; by abstinence from evil thought...."(26) Again, the egalitarianism which Buddhism upheld in a caste-ridden social setting did not escape Huxley's implicit admiration. "Gautama," he declared:

And lastly, there was the highest reach of Buddhistperfection, a goal epitomized in a word which was quite alien to Westernreligiousideas, namely, nirvaa.na. Huxley, understandably enough, sought to dwell briefly on its possible meaning and implications. Now this was a matter over which some of Huxley's

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contemporaries disputed, often with little evidence of relevant knowledge; quite a few of them indeed contended that nirvaa.na signified annihilationpure and simple.(28) Seeking to judge what is at issue here in the light of the Oriental research with which he had come into contact,(29) Huxley on the other hand found "the acme of Buddhisticphilosophy" beyond conception and description, though this to his way of thinking "comes to exactly the same thing as annihilation."(30) Interestingly enough, he added, however, that it was not "annihilation in the ordinary sense," for the abolition of pain and sorrow envisaged in nirvaa.na is actually regarded by Buddhists as a positive bliss, and the followers of this religion, he said, are greatly inspired "with an ecstatic desire to reach it."(31)

Needless to say, Huxley can be hardly credited with having quite succeeded in gaining a true insight into the religious import of nirvaa.na. Nevertheless, his openminded effort to understand its meaning must not, I think, go unnoticed; Huxley's perceptions here were somewhat ahead of those of John Stuart Mill.(32) Huxley's evident tendency to link Buddhistthought with Westernideas, which comes to the fore strikingly in his comments on the concept of substance, was further exemplified at other levels of his discussion as well. He found the nontheistic stance taken by the early Buddhists to be analogous to the outlook of Heracleitus and referred, in addition, to "many parallelisms of Stoicism and Buddhism," pointing in particular to a notion common to the two systems, namely, that of craving, designated in Buddhism as ta.nhaa. Perhaps more significant, he even ventured to indicate the possibility of clarifying certain Buddhist stances in terms of models that science offers. The transmission of karman between individualexistences conceived as egolessphenomenal associations is a point to which he briefly alluded in this connection. This, he suggested, is something that might be understood after the manner of the communication of magnetic induction from one medium to another.(33)

In any event, such then are the main features of the evaluation of Buddhism which Huxley incorporated into his discussion in Evolution and Ethics. True, it is brief, limited in scope, and as indicated above, contains certain questionable judgments. Still, this evaluation provided by an eminent Victorian is very notable

What can the philosophically minded modern reader learn from the evaluative comments on Buddhism that are set forth in Huxley's Evolution and Ethics? I shall next offer a few reflections which might go some way towards answering this very pertinent question.

Though Huxley was not prepared to endorse Buddhist teachings in their entirety, he no doubt saw certain commendable features in them. Now the features he admired greatly in this religion appear to be those that serve to give it a distinctly humanisticcharacter. I think Huxley would hardly have found any difficulty in going along with Silvain Levi's representation of Buddhism as a system which sustains three basic humanistic values--sagesse, douceur, pitie (wisdom, Enetleness, and compassion).(36) However, the attraction Huxley sometimes evinces for Buddhism also highlights something of particular interest to the comparativist, namely, the existence of an area of common ground between antisupernaturalist, critical, and empirical modes of thoughtmanifesting in the West and some notable approaches of Buddhist philosophy. The recorded reactions to Buddhism on the part of such other nineteenth-century secular thinkers as John Stuart Mill (cited at the beginning of this paper) and also Nietzsche(37) indeed tend to bear this out further. Moreover, Huxley's readiness to take Buddhistideas into serious account in the course of a general intellectualdiscussion shows that by about the latter part of the nineteenth century Buddhism had had an impact on the reflective circles in the Victorian milieu. All in all, his evaluation I think served to establish two things not much recognized in the nineteenth century, though better known to us: (i) Buddhism is a religion which incorporates a notable philosophicaldimension, and (ii) some of the standpoints of this religion admit of comparison with Western ideas--especially those rooted in empiricalthought.

Evidently, the deeper commitments of Buddhist living--its ideal of rennuciation in particular--did not appeal to Huxley. What this indicates is in turn not

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without significance: though there are some points of contact between Westernsecularthought and Buddhism, the latter as a soteriological system embraces highly distinctive attitudes and emphases. And these, needless to say, remain permanently alien to secular thought.(38) There is yet another matter that touches on Huxley's evaluation as a whole which deserves brief mention here. A modern reviewer can hardly overlook the fact that it was on the conceptualprinciples implicit in Buddhist textual sources--rather than the practical form this religion assumes among actual believers--that he sought to focus particular attention.(39) Though he did not say so, Huxley indeed seems to have acted on the presumption that one should, in the course of scholarly inquiry abstract, so to say, the philosophicalsubstratum of the Buddhistreligion and make that the object of analysis and comment. Such nonsociological, "intellectualist" approaches to the study of Buddhism were frequently adopted by Orientalists in Huxley's time and after. Monier Williams,(40) for example, went to some lengths in actually advocating something like it. One must recognize, however, that the adequacy of "intellectualist" approaches is increasingly being questioned today.(41) Yet Huxley, I think, shows that they can be illuminating in their own way, It should be remembered that his identification of certain affinities between Buddhism and Westen thought was the outcome of a focusing of attention on and a preoccupation with this religion's informing ideas. And a knowledge of such ideas of course comes preeminently from a probing of Buddhist texts (or studies made on them) rather than an examination of popular religiousbehavior associated with Buddhism.

1. In Tact, in his very revealing reference (which occurs in the index to The History of British India, 5th ed. (London, 1858), vol. 1,pp. 250-251, and the entry under "Buddha") , James Mill indentified the Buddha as "one of the incarnations of Vishnu." Buddha, he also acknowledged, was "worshipped over a great part of the East," but, notably enough, he was of the view that the question whether his religion was derived from Brahma or that of Brahma from him was difficult of solution

2. See "The Utility of Religion," in J. S. Mill. Three Essays on Religion (London, 1874), p. 121. Repeating a then widespread view, which of course Buddhists themselves do not favor, Mill interpreted their religion's highest goal (nirvaa.na) simply as annihilation. Still, far from decrying Buddhism on this account (as often happened in nineteenth-century Western circles), he held it forth

4. The edition used in the sequel is Evolution and Ethics, 1893-1943, by T. H. Huxley and Julian Huxley (London: Pilot Press, 1947); hereafter cited as Huxley, Evolution and Ethics. In addition to the text of Huxley's lecture and the introduction to it, which he wrote subsequently under the title "Prolegomena," this edition also contains interesting critical and retrospective observations on both these compositions by Julian Huxley, the noted twentieth-century biologist.

20. Davids. Buddhism, p. 79. It is noteworthy that T. W. Rhys Davids' Hibbert Lectures, 1881 (London: Norgate & Williams, 1881) (one of the acknowledged souces of Huxley's own evaluation of the religion, as will be shown below), refer in passing (pp. 125, 155) to certain general resemblances in the outlooks of the Buddha and Hume. One would do well to remember also that Huxley was the author of a survey of both Hume's and Berkeley's philosophies, namely Hume, with helps to the Study of Berkeley (London, 1894).

39. The suggestion that latter-day Buddhism is contaminated with "a base admixture of foreign superstitions" (an idea broached in Huxley's overview of the religion given on p. 74, and quoted in section II of this article) is very revealing in this connection, and deserves to be borne in mind.

42. Huxley noted (op. cit. p. 87, note 4) significantly that "for what I have said about Indian Philosophy, I am particularly indebted to the luminousexposition of primitive Buddhism and its relations to earlier Hinduthought, which is given by Prof. Rhys Davids in his remarkable Hibbert Lectures, 1881, and Buddhism (1890) . The only apology I can offer for the freedom with which I have borrowed from him in these notes is my desire to leave no doubt as to my indebtedness. I have also found Dr. Oldenberg's Buddha (Ed. 2, 1890) very helpful." The last-named work is a translation of the German original by Hermann Oldenberg, Buddha, Sein Leben, Seine Lehre, Seine Gemeinde (Berlin, 1880) . Its sometimes negative assessments of Buddhistideas have been regarded as one of the sources of Nietzsche's harsher judgments on the religion, for Oldenberg was widely read in the nineteenth century. Cf. F. Mistry, Nietzsche and Buddhism (Berlin and New York, 1981), p. 114. The less appreciative or inaccurate aspects of Huxley's evaluation (on nirvaa.na, renunciation) might be perhaps linked again to Oldenberg's influence. Rhys Davids, on the other hand, gave a more balanced and informed account of Buddhism; the overall soundness of Huxley's own treatment of the subject in the Evolution and Ethics I think is in large measure reflective of this British Orientalist's mature interpretations of Buddhism.